Celeste Bryant She/her

Celeste is a trans woman who identifies as trans-femme and was born in Milton Keynes in 1998. She first encountered Q:alliance in late 2022 after struggling with anxiety and identity. Prompted by the Mindline Trans helpline, she attended a Q:alliance safe space in March 2023, where she felt welcomed and affirmed for the first time. Initially she identified as gender fluid and she described the dysphoria she had experienced. Her ‘egg-crack’ moment – acceptance of who she was – came in a phone call with a close friend, Chloe. It was followed by affirming conversations at work. That marked the beginning of her transition. She talks about developing her feminine presentation from nice nails or a bracelet to going out in public wearing a skirt. She has become active within the local LGBTQ+ heritage scene and became involved in the Q:alliance Heritage Project: photographing LGBTQ+ sites and later interviewing others. She is working to complete her social transition, having already come out to most colleagues and has her name on the list for the NHS gender transition process. She went to her first PRIDEs – Deanshanger and Milton Keynes – in 2024. She loves Milton Keynes as a place of transformation and belonging.